Contact Me: Advice

Subject: Advice
Posted: 7 Jul 2010 8:51 pm

Hi there, I hope you are well...

I wondered if you could give me any more advice other than what is already on this excellent site.

Myself and a small group of friends are getting ready to do the end to end walk in September for charity. We are aiming to do it in around a month, so a lot of walking per day!

We are thinking that we are going to have to "wild" camp most of the time so I don't know if there is anything major that we need to think about for this.

I take it the route that you used was the most scenic route as the way that you went is the way that we are looking to follow..

If there is any advice you can give me it would be very much appreciated.

Thanks
Eiran Lenton

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Subject: Planning LEJOG
Posted: 8 Jul 2010 12:41 pm

Hi Eiran.

To be honest, I've put everything I can think of on my site, so it pretty much sums up all the advice I have!

I haven't done any wild camping myself, but I know a lot of people do. The best thing you can do is have a look through the links to other people's websites on my 'Useful Links' page, and check out the ones who did a bit of wild camping:

www.landsendjohnogroats.info/walking_tips/links.html

You might like to try Geoff Gafford's 'Ultra-lightweight hiking and backpacking' blog, or Pete's 'Gyp tackles LEJOG' blog - I think they both did a bit of off-piste camping.

My route was definitely scenic, and if you wanted to cut it down then you could do worse than heading straight from Edinburgh to Inverness. I'd also consider side-stepping the Cotswold Way and heading up the Severn, as described by Pete here:

www.landsendjohnogroats.info/guestbook/viewtopic.php?t=2621

It's a thought, anyway.

If you've got any specific questions, then feel free to post them to my guestbook, and I'll be happy to answer them. Good luck!

Best wishes,

Mark

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Subject: Wild camping
Posted: 8 Jul 2010 9:40 pm

Hi Eiran,

LEJOG in a month! I admire your pluck. 900 miles in 30 days is 30 miles a day (without rest days). 10 hours a day at 3 m.p.h.

On the subject of camping I have just updated my blog

http://gyptackleslejog.blogspot.com/

and the spreadsheet now shows details of all of the campsites I used (Grid Ref, telephone numbers, notes and prices)

As for wild camping, there are loads of opportunities on the South West Coast Path and on the River Severn, especially if you don't want to be near civilisation. From there to the border is much more tricky. As you may know you can legally camp anywhere in Scotland as long as it is not near houses or running water.

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Subject: Camping in Scotland
Posted: 12 Jul 2010 10:02 am

I didn't know that about camping in Scotland, Pete - thanks for pointing it out. I'll be telling people that when they ask!

Mark

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